Payday Super

What is Payday Super?

[Updated 20 May 2026]

Note: The relevant legislation passed both houses of parliament on 4 November 2025. The ATO website will contain the most current information regarding Payday Superannuation and at their request we link to that information, rather than republish.

Sybiz Visipay 26.10 (released 11 May 2026) is the minimum version required to support Payday Super reporting requirements. This version successfully completed ATO testing requirements on 16 March 2026 for the changes in STP reporting to support Payday Super.

With a commencement date of 1 July 2026, Payday Superannuation is an initiative to reduce unpaid super and ensure employees' superannuation accounts receive contributions in a timely fashion. The legislation passed the Australian parliament on 4 November 2025. Payday Superannuation will require superannuation to be paid at the same time as regular salary or wages, instead of the current quarterly requirements. Further, super contributions must hit member super funds within 7 business days of pay date, and super funds have 3 days to match the funds to members where auto matching fails.

Unlike other recent initiatives, there is no scope for Payday Super deferrals. The ATO will work with employers on compliance issues before jumping straight to penalties, unless the breaches are deliberate. The ATO has published these guidelines regarding their compliance approach.

Payday Super FAQs

Watch the latest webinar

Ordinary Time Earnings replaced by Qualifying Earnings

Prior to Version 25.10, Sybiz Visipay had an informal concept of OTE; this has now been formalised as a check box in pay items in Version 25.10. However, as more information has materialised from the ATO there is a new term, Qualifying Earnings (QE) which denotes whether a pay item would ordinarily attract super. As such, it is crucial for Sybiz Visipay users to revisit their pay items and ensure OTE (relabelled as QE from Sybiz Visipay 26.00) is being applied correctly to the relevant pay items. Reporting of QE will be required under STP2 and will be supported from Sybiz Visipay 26.10 for the 2026/27 financial year and beyond.

Adjusting reported Qualified Earnings

Qualifying Earnings

Qualifying Earnings includes all pay items that are currently treated as OTE and also includes additional amounts that are not classified as OTE (for example, commissions earned wholly from work performed outside of normal hours).

Essentially, Qualifying Earnings is the number which the ATO will use in calculating the Superannuation Guarantee Charge in the event you fail to meet Payday Super obligations. Please refer to the ATO resources regarding these concepts, including this overview video.

We also invite Sybiz Visipay users to check out our Payday Super and Sybiz Visipay 26.10 Update webinar (22 May 2026), a recording of which has been made available on our site. But please be aware updated information will be more reliable as it becomes available.

Key Visipay 26.10 changes for Payday Super

Maximum Contribution Base

The Maximum Contribution Base (MCB) is changing from quarterly to annually. Sybiz Visipay 26.10 and above will automatically handle the change by treating the remainder of the 2025/26 financial year as quarterly and 2026/27 and beyond as annual, and also by centralising the MCB behind the scenes. Qualifying Earnings will report up to the MCB.

Employers can control the applicability of the MCB at the staff type level.

The MCB value for the 2026/27 financial year is $270,830, based on the new concessional contribution cap of $32,500 divided by 12%. This value will be prepopulated once you roll into 2026/27 and can be viewed and set under Company... Tax Details.

ESG Shortfall Exemption Certificates

For employees subject to an exclusion from ESG under an Employer Super Guarantee Shortfall Exemption Certificate, a new Hold ESG Until date field is available in employee records. Employer Super Guarantee and Qualifying Earnings will be paused from calculating and reporting until the date specified.

Default Superfund

For convenience, you can now store your employer default super fund under Settings... Common Settings. New Member Number is the placeholder member number you may need to provide for enrolling new members. Consult with your default fund if you're unsure about this value.

User interface changes

Many changes in the software are set to automatically take place upon rolling into the 2026/27 financial year.

The ATO Submission buttons have been renamed STP Submission.
A new Pay Run tab centralises many of the processes used during a typical pay run. Every button is also contained in its original ribbon for users who prefer their existing workflow. A button for Sybiz Super Transfer will be added to the Pay Run ribbon will be added in the new financial year.
Qualifying Earnings will be included on the STP2 Reconciliation report. It will show $0 for the 2025/26 financial year even though your pay items are tagged for Qualifying Earnings.
Superannuation submission will function as a transfer, similar to a bank transfer, rather than an export. The SybizSuper Export function will remain available for the final payment of the 2025/26 financial year, while the Sybiz Super Transfer will take over from 2026/27 onward. Once no longer needed, the SybizSuper Export button will disappear after rolling into the 2027/28 financial year. A SAFF file module option is available for non-SybizSuper users.

Planning ahead

There are steps Sybiz Visipay users can take now ahead of Payday Super to prepare for its implementation:

Upgrade to Sybiz Visipay 26.10 (released 11 May 2026). This is the minimum version required to support Payday Super reporting for Single Touch Payroll.
Since Sybiz Visipay 26.00 pay items are able to be designated as Qualifying Earnings (QE) which is the flag that lets the ATO know the ESG applies to that pay item. Pay items should be reviewed to ensure they are flagged as required. Any pay items previously flagged as "Superannuation: Does Apply" will be flagged as QE.
Review pay items director's fees, and bonus and commission pay items regarding the applicability of super and Qualifying Earnings. Any pay items that are not Qualifying Earnings but you choose to pay extra super upon should have their Qualifying Earnings flags unchecked.
Review your pay frequency as it may make sense, if permitted, to change to a less frequent payroll to reduce the administrative burden.
The ATO recommends that the final contributions for the 2025/26 financial year are reported and paid prior to 1 July, if possible. If there is an overlap in contributions once Payday Super commences the Payday Super contributions will be deemed to apply to the final 2025/26 contributions. Contact the ATO if you have concerns about this.
Make plans now to move away from the Small Business Superannuation Clearing House, which will cease operation on 1 July 2026.
Out-of-cycle or ad-hoc pays have the same reporting treatment under Payday Super as they do under STP - that is they can be reported as part of your next normal pay cycle. The exception to this is termination pays.
If you're using Sybiz Visipay to pay super for contractors under Voluntary Agreements or Non-Employees (previously unsupported from an STP reporting perspective), Sybiz Visipay 26.11 (scheduled for release closer to 30 June 2026) will add this functionality.
Ensure you have the ability to complete Member Verification Requests for new employees and employees who change super funds (our onboarding solution will support MVR). Further solutions will become available during 2026/27.
ATO communications may also touch on the requirement to link a SSID to your ATO records because Sybiz Visipay uses a Sending Service Provider (SuperChoice Services). A deferral for this requirement has been granted until 30 June 2027 to reduce the burden of transitioning to Payday Super.
Review SuperStream submission responses for any uncorrected errors - some super funds will accept submissions that have incorrect details, such as incorrect member numbers, if other information is sufficient to provide a match. With tighter timelines under Payday Super, some funds may start rejecting incorrect submissions they previously accepted. For SybizSuper users, review completed submissions in the Sybiz Employer Portal that do not have a tick in the status indicator.
Familiarise yourself with the ATO compliance approach.
Beware of scams, especially if making changes to your clearing house and/or leaving changes to the last minute. The move to Payday Super has required significant investment from software developers, expect reasonable costs to be passed on to employers. As always, if an offer sounds to be good to be true, it probably is.

Items that are still 'up-in-the-air' as at 20 May 2026 (we can't link you to official ATO resources as they do not exist at this point, in some cases regulations do not yet exist):

The ATO has not yet clarified mixed commencement dates for Member Verification Requests readiness. It could be July 2026 or March 2027 based on conflicting information.